Welcome to the Piano World Piano ForumsOver 2 million posts about pianos, digital pianos, and all types of keyboard instruments
Join the World's Largest Community of Piano Lovers
(it's free)
It's Fun to Play the Piano ... Please Pass It On!

: I took part of the chords from Internet the rest is my interpretation played by ear

Instrument used:

DP Roland FP-7

Recording method:

DP to audacity

Technical feedback wanted:

Yes

Additional info:

As before, it is the next stop on my journey to my piano destination i.e. playing known standards or beautiful but less known tunes in the style between jazz and so called cocktail piano.

This rendition of this wonderful standard is probably the “Flag Ship” of my present repertoire and at the same time my next tentative foray into realm of “creative interpretation”. (I’m not quite sure if it deserves to be named improvisation...) It’s a simple, adult beginner’s interpretation (improvisation), not too far from the melody, mainly on diatonic notes. On the other hand, I think the listener should always hear some elements of the tune even in an improvisation. It’s more readable.

I was practicing it as a piano only tune and some day pushed, by chance, the “Split” button on my Roland and suddenly I heard a kind of Trio. It would be my dreams come true if I ever played in such an ensemble. So I decided to present to you this 1.000.001 version of Autumn Leaves in such a form.

And now some technicalities. The split magic transformed my left hand into acoustic bass and cymbal - the rhythm section. In the left hand I played some kind of stride piano which proved to be convenient and translated mainly into (acoustic) bass and cymbal on the first and the third beat and cymbal with parts of chords on the second and fourth ones. (Arpeggiated chords in the left hand are still beyond my reach . I guess it’s the result of not playing from sheet music at all.) The chords are played more or less by both hands. There is also a part containing walking bass - my first attempt.

I hope very much you would enjoy it regardless of its too wide scope of deficiencies .

I love how melancholy and sentimental this is. The description in the book is "vals sentimental." I envision a woman looking at faded photographs of her long ago love. She goes into quite a reverie in the second half of this piece.

There are 7 waltzes in this collection, plus an introduction and conclusion. I've played the two slow ones (nos. 3 & 6) and a third one (no. 1) slowly! Yes, there's a reason my name is ADAGIO.

This is a simple arrangement. I don't have a clue what I'm doing. I learned the chords from "Piano Chords and Scales Made Easy", and improvised the melody from singing it. For the left hand I watched the pianist at church until I found a simple, easy to learn pattern that would fit. I started out learning it in G, but realised after 2 weeks that i couldn't sing it in that key, so switched it to C. I hope I didn't hurt your ears too much.

These Inventions are fun, but they are wicked hard for such itty bitty little suckers. I spent 4 months learning No. 1 and can still barely play it. I've been doing No. 8 for 2 years and still mangled it near the end. My next one will be No. 4. I hear that's a little easier, so maybe I'll pair it up with another one for a future recital. BTW - for those not familiar, the recording has No 1. first then a pause then No. 8.

This piece is actually the first movement from Sonatina in A minor Op. 88 No. 3 by Kuhlau. It was one of the three pieces that I selected for my grade 5 piano exam (ABRSM Grade 5 (2009-2010). I selected this piece because at the time I was studying Kuhlau's six OP. 55 sonatinas with my music teacher. Since I was doing the exam on my own I figured there should be some similarities with what I had seen before in the Op 55 sonatinas and this one.

When I first played the piece, the beginning measures reminded me a lot of the beginning measures in Fur Elise. I was taken aback somewhat. But I recall reading somewhere that composers of that era freely "borrowed" ideas from each other. So maybe that would explain the similarity between the two pieces.

I enjoyed learning this piece as well as the other sonatinas from Kuhlau. I hope you'll enjoy listening to it. Thanks for listening.

I am playing this piece on the first Friday of June as an actual recital piece. I consider this recording rough by the standards of this forum, but not bad for me. I would be totally happy if I played this piece this well for my live recital. Any feedback you have for me that makes that more likely would be heartily welcomed.

For lunch, I had two PBJ's (one I made for myself, and one my two year old eschewed).

This piece was a real stretch for me. It’s something far beyond my normal Alfred’s Adult All-In-One Book comfort level (and is also my first non-Alfred’s recital piece). It’s one of a number of piano pieces that got me to start on my current piano journey, one that I thought “it would be great if I could learn to play this”. So well before I was really ready for it, I started trying to tackle this piece. I’ve been at it for many months now and it’s still far from perfect (as you will hear). I’m glad I did it though; I’ve had a lot of fun trying to learn the various parts and working on it has helped me through some slumps when the current Alfred’s pieces weren’t “doing it for me”. Anyway, I hope you enjoy listening to this good old Two Step from 1912.

This piece is taken from the French film Amelie. It is probably Yann's most well-known piece which makes it strange that I have never formally recorded it. I tried to base my interpretation on his live performance on the 'C'etait Ici' album, rather than the written score.

I love this piece. It was fun to learn and took me about 4 weeks altogether. For some reason, a little more difficul;t to memorize than others of hers. I find that Martha Mier Romantic and Jazz pieces are a nice addition to my clasical study as they provide opportunity to complete expressive pieces in a few weeks.

This is my update, but it still proves what I've said all along - we're all beginners at something For the kind of thing I play now in many ways being a good sight reader has been an awful handicap - but it's such a habit that I have trouble breaking it (even bad habits are hard to break ). But I've been trying.

In previous pieces I've played in the recitals I've arranged variations in order to practice some of the licks I might need for improvising. The biggest one, as you can here hear, is using open 5ths/6ths in the right hand for harmonies. Another is a little "waggle" sound that I picked up from banjo players. I also like chromatic runs to modulate. I can wiggle my fingers to get little fills .

The new skill I was primarily attempting was to be able to play what I'm hearing in my head, and to actually have something to "say" with my improv. The old tricks that I had to use to even come close include - slowing it down, knowing the chord progression really well (FAIL - ), staying in the music, and various others.

So you're forewarned - this is one pass of play-by-ear with a little "stuff" thrown in, and a little less of what is obviously right-on-the-edge-of-out-of-control improv.

These are three movements from the Fruit of the Spirit Suite for solo piano. I composed this about five years ago. The first of the three, No. 6 Goodness, is a three-voice fugue. I think that the fugue is styled less like Bach and more like a Mozart fuge I was playing at the time, in that I used several harmonies that include a major 2nd. The second, No. 7 Faithfulness,is a twelve-tone composition. Although I randomly selected the tone row and strictly followed the rules, I was able to achieve a gentler atonal sound that approaches a major/minor tonality by layering the rows. The third is No. 3 Peace. It has no sophisticated compositional technique, and may possibly be in an AB or ABC form.The complete suite has nine movements and runs about 17 minutes.

I am far from happy with this recording. My expectations were set on been able to deliver a good recording of the first prelude of the WTC (BWV 846). Unfortunately, though I already have the keys on my fingers I am far from providing a decent interpretation according to the dinamics set by my teacher. So, I had to fall back to this piece to which I had paid less attention lately, so it's not much better neither. I edited the wav file to delete a silent period caused by a distraction. Now, a day after, I realize I did not make the repetitions.

Recorded on May 12, 2009 using a Flip Ultra video camera (recorded video for my YouTube page). I then ripped the audio from the video file using a program called Switch Sound File Converter.

Technical feedback wanted:

No

Additional info:

Just me playing Eyes On Me from the Final Fantasy VIII Piano Collections. This one's pretty difficult for a newbie like me but I did my best, I'm still not completely satisfied with my performance but it'll have to do for now. This is also the first Final Fantasy Piano Collections piece I've attempted. It took me around a month of on and off practice to learn. I hope you enjoy it!

I played a more complex version of this piece (with flute and double bass accompaniment) for my high school music exam 20 years ago so when I started playing again recently this was one of my first goal pieces. Weirdly the only thing I could remember of this piece after a 20 year break from playing piano was a single left hand chord ;-)

This is my first time submitting a piece for recital and also my first time recording myself. Please excuse the piano. It is only a month or so old and is still adjusting to its surroundings. I apologize if it is out of tune.

I love the "Adagio cantabile" from the "Sonate Pathetique". It begins and ends like a proper classical slow movement, but as it develops, it darkens harmonically and becomes rhythmically agitated. My Baldwin L has a rich base register that is well-suited to this movement.

Despite the left thumb still being in a splint I got another piece done for the recital, so I'm happy about that. I like the tempo I had on this but it was just a bit too fast for my ability so there are some hesitations, oh well.